50 years of wear to its spine means the little book now automatically falls open at page 206. It’s as a good page as any for a book of quotations that has been my good companion over 50 years, 16 house moves, three countries, three children and millions of words churned out in essays, articles, speeches, press releases, advertising copy and help with school homework.
It has been “My loved, my honoured, much respected friend” as student, advertising and PR man, dad and journalist. It has rescued me from writer’s block; been a frequent tool in the art of persuasion, led me down wonderful highways and byways of the mind, salved stress, unlocked hidden delights and given me the wherewithal to pretend to be at least half educated.
For me, the book’s life began in 1976 in Simpson’s stationers and bookshop on Kempock St, Gourock, and where, in the basement, was produced the local weekly newspaper, The Gourock Times. It was where I rushed with the book tokens my godparents sent me every birthday and Christmas. Simpsons was a temple to the written word. The newspaper and the shop have long gone now.
I’m sure Mr Simpson, the paper’s editor followed the great edict of The Manchester Guardian’s C P Scott, who wrote in May 1926, the famous words on how newspapers should behave; “Comment is free, but facts are sacred.” I learned this on page 356, very early in my ownership of the dictionary.
All the world in these pages
Falling from a tree aged ten, and experiencing extended medical care, saw me fail to pass the 11+, the exam that separated the brainy from the less so. Consequently, Collins Gem Dictionary of Quotations (Collins London and Glasgow) filled many an educational gap over the years. It nudged my curiosity and opened the door to all kinds of knowledge. All the world is in those pages. Here, I was introduced to literature, history, philosophy, poetry, art, polemic, rhetoric and those two glorious figures, Robert Burns and William Shakespeare.
When I came, a few years after buying the book, to do my Higher English, in preparation for entry to the great and ancient university of Aberdeen, I already knew the plot of MacBeth, and all the most important quotes needed to impress the examiners. When I began my political studies degree I had a grasp of Plato, Aristotle, John Stewart Mill, Karl Marx and Thomas Hobbes, all because a book three inches by two and a half inches had inside its covers much of the wisdom, wit, folly and genius of the world. “Contains almost 4,000 quotes,” it says on the front cover.
It was reading quotes from Burns that led me to explore his life and works. A pastime that has brought much “Peace. enjoyment, love, and pleasure!” And it was Burns that fired my internationalism.
“For a’ that, an’ a’ that,
It’s comin yet for a’ that,
That Man to Man the warld o’er
Shall brithers be for a’ that.”
Page 206 tells me that the 17th century English churchman Thomas Fuller gave us, “It is always darkest just before the day dawneth.” Galileo Galilei uttered “Eppur si muove, But it does move” and Rose Fyleman wrote “There are fairies at the bottom of our garden”.
The embarrassing young
The same page informs that the Paisley-born communist, Willie Gallacher, wrote The case for Communism and gives a single long quote from the work. He promotes “drawing strength from cooperation with the peoples of other lands”.
The French Impressionist painter Paul Gauguin merits three quotes, the most arresting of which is “Civilisation is paralysis”. The final entry on page 206 is a quote from another French artistic figure. Paul Gavarni. He has one line; “Les enfants terribles. The embarrassing young.” And I was certainly that.
Part of the motivation for buying the wee book was the hope that the new-found learning its pages offered would help in impressing young women. Like many young men, I was often a tongue-tied swain. The idea was that I would have a witty or learned quote to hand, thus persuading Sally, or Patricia, or Liz or Rebecca to instantly see me as a man of substance and one to be embraced. There is no recorded incident of the strategy meeting with success. “O wad some power the giftie gie us to see oursels as ithers see us.”
All politicians should be required to have that quote tattooed on their souls, or perhaps Sir Walter Scott’s words from his novel, Redgauntlet, “The ae half o the warld thinks the tither daft.”
My five decades old Collins Gem Dictionary of Quotations still has the ability to throw up a quote for me to read for the first time. Recently, I came across this from the American revolutionary and political philosopher, Thomas Paine. It seems wholly apt for today’s world.
“The sublime and the ridiculous are often so nearly related, that it is difficult to class them separately.”
Happy birthday my wee book of quotations. You made my world a better place.
Collins Gem Dictionary of Quotations has been my friend these past five decades, as trusty and dependable a one as a man may wish. It’s showing its age, so I must follow Samuel Johnson’s advice: “A man, Sir, should keep his friendships in constant repair.” A trip to the bookbinder is the wee book’s next stop.
First published in The Scotsman on 25 March 2026.
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